White Sox lose 107th game after defeat to Mets, most in franchise history

It has been accepted for months that the 2024 White Sox are the worst team in franchise history, but now it is official.

On September 1, the White Sox lost 2-0 to the New York Mets, setting a new franchise record for most losses in a season with 107.

The White Sox finished 56-106 in 1970 and set a new record with a loss on the last day of the season, October 1, 1970. The 2024 team is much more efficient at losing.

With the local goal achieved, the Sox (31-107) have 24 games left this season to truly make history.

Because it's the Mets, of course, Chicago is really in the hunt this season. The 1962 Mets, an expansion team, lost 120 games, the modern record for losing streaks in a season. The Sox were bad until June, but the Mets' legendary mark of 1962 still seemed far-fetched.

Chicago then went 7-44 in July and August and now needs just 14 losses this month to break that record. They have lost no fewer than 19 games in a month so far this season.

Garrett Crochet struck out the first seven batters he faced, but the Sox, who have scored the fewest runs in baseball with 420, managed just two hits.

“We're here to talk about winning games, and I've only done it 31 times this year,” said Chuck Garfien, host of the White Sox postgame show on Sunday. “And it seems like I haven't done it in forever.”

“I don't think I was here the last time they won,” said Garfien's partner Ozzie Guillen, who led the team to the World Series title in 2005.

That must have been on August 21, when they won in San Francisco, ending an unusually successful away tour with a 2-4 score.

Sunday's loss capped a 10-0 home streak, another first in franchise history. Their previous longest winless home streak was seven games and occurred in May.

Their current 10-game losing streak is only the third-longest of the season. They lost 21 straight games from July 10 to August 5 and 14 straight games from May 22 to June 6. They are the first team to do that since the 1965 Mets, who went 50-112-2.

Chicago has won only six series all season, but has now been swept 22 times.

When will the team set the all-time record? It could be soon.

Next they hit the road with stops in Baltimore and Boston. The Sox have a 13-53 road record and have only one road series all year, May 3-5, when they won two of three games in St. Louis.

Chicago entered the season expecting to lose 100 games for the second straight year. New general manager Chris Getz was already prepared for a tough season when he traded the team's top player, Dylan Cease, at the end of spring training.

The team responded to these low expectations with a 3-22 start. The race to futility was on. Manager Pedro Grifol was mercifully fired on August 8. The Sox are 3-17 under interim manager Grady Sizemore.

In 2023, they finished 61-101, a 20-game drop from the previous year. It was such a bad season that chairman Jerry Reinsdorf, known for his loyalty to his Chicago Bulls and White Sox executives, released his longtime top two players in baseball, Kenny Williams and Rick Hahn, after the July trade deadline.

Despite the team's failures after a failed rebuilding attempt, Chicago's layoffs were a shock. What happened next was not.

Getz, who was in charge of a struggling farm system, was promoted to take his place on July 31. In a disheartening press conference that day, Reinsdorf admitted he had not been looking for a new GM.

“I've come to the conclusion that we owe it to our fans and to ourselves not to waste any time,” Reinsdorf said. “We want to get better as quickly as possible. If I had come from the outside, it would have taken everyone at least a year to evaluate the organization. I could have brought Branch Rickey back. He would have taken a year to evaluate the organization.”

Exactly one year later, the Sox set the franchise record for losses.

In the modern age of tanking, a bad season can be seen as a victory of sorts, as it helps the front office plan for the future. But Getz has been criticized for the returns on his trades at the deadline, and due to new anti-tanking rules, the Sox cannot draft higher than 10th in next year's amateur draft.

They picked fifth this year and drafted Arkansas pitcher Hagen Smith. The organization's young pitchers are the only positive thing right now. But the major league product is pushing the franchise toward a historic precipice.

“Ultimately, it’s embarrassing,” Guillen said in the aftermath show.

“This is crazy,” said Garfien.

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(Photo: Quinn Harris/Getty Images)